Iran’s Assembly of Experts has officially appointed Mojtaba Khamenei as the country’s new supreme leader, state media reported on Sunday. The announcement follows the death of his father, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who was killed in joint U.S. and Israeli strikes on Iranian territory on February 28.
According to The Jerusalem Post, the Assembly of Experts met on Thursday, with the majority attending online, to discuss the appointment after “heavy pressure” from the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) to name Mojtaba as the new supreme leader.
“With the majority of votes, the person who will continue the path of Imam Khomeini and the path of the martyr Imam Khamenei has been chosen. The name of Khamenei will continue. The vote has been cast and will be announced soon,” Hosseinali Eshkevari, a member of Iran’s Assembly of Experts said on Sunday.
Mojtaba, the second son of the late supreme leader, has never held an official position in the Islamic Republic’s government. He fought in the Iran‑Iraq War and earned the clerical rank of “hojjatoleslam” after studying under conservative religious scholars in the seminaries of Qom.
Despite Iran’s ideological resistance to hereditary succession, Mojtaba’s backing from the IRGC bolstered his rise. He maintains close relationships with IRGC chief Ahmad Vahidi, former head of IRGC intelligence Hossein Taeb, and political figures such as Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf.
Ayatollah Mohsen Heidari Alekasir, senior member of the Assembly of Experts, said that a candidate had been selected based on the late supreme leader’s advice that Iran’s top leader should “be hated by the enemy” rather than praised by it.
Meanwhile, speaking to ABC News, President Donald Trump said the next supreme leader “is not going to last long” without U.S. approval.
“We want to make sure that we don’t have to go back every 10 years, when you don’t have a president like me that’s not going to do it.” Trump continued. “I don’t want people to have to go back in five years and have to do the same thing again or worse let them have a nuclear weapon.”
When asked whether he would be willing to approve someone with ties to the old regime, Trump replied: “I would, in order to choose a good leader I would, yeah, I would. There are numerous people that could qualify.”
The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) meanwhile said Israel “will continue to pursue every successor and every person who seeks to appoint a successor.”
پس از خنثیسازی خامنهای ستمگر، رژیم تروریستی ایران تلاش میکند خود را بازسازی کرده و رهبر جدیدی انتخاب کند.
مجلس خبرگان ایران که دهها سال است تشکیل جلسه نداده، بهزودی در شهر قم گرد هم خواهد آمد. میخواهیم به شما بگوئیم که دست کشور اسرائیل همچنان هر جانشین و هر کسی را که در پی…
— ارتش دفاعی اسرائیل | IDF Farsi (@IDFFarsi) March 8, 2026
